


The Aftermath

by cherryburlesque



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Emotional Trauma, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post Season 6, SHEITH - Freeform, Season 6 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-15
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2019-05-23 19:46:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14940689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherryburlesque/pseuds/cherryburlesque
Summary: Shiro is recovering, and Keith is coming to terms with everything he's been through since flinging himself through the wormhole after that pod.“Stay with me,” Shiro says softly.“I’m right here.”Shiro shakes his head and tugs again, this time more insistent.Keith’s heart belts in his chest when he realises what Shiro is asking, and he wastes no time in crawling onto the bed beside him and settling against his side. Shiro’s arm curls around his shoulders and pulls him close, and for the first time in a long time Keith can’t think of any place he’d rather be than right here.“I missed you,” Shiro says softly.He’s asleep before he can realise that quiet tears are staining Keith’s cheeks again.





	The Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

> This is the only way I could process what S6 put us through. By having Keith try to work through everything that happened to him.  
> Also, I am wholly uncreative with titles, my bad. 
> 
> **Spoilers for Season 6 ahead.**
> 
> Idk about everyone else but personally I consider a phoeb roughly equivalent to a month, and a decaphoeb around a year.

Shiro doesn’t wake once Allura has told him to rest.

He leans against Keith, breath evening out into something far less laboured and more natural, and remains there while the team formulates a plan to get back to Earth. His body is heavy and warm, and Keith holds him close with only one ear on the conversation at hand.

He looks _so tired._

It’s the kind of bone weary look that Keith feels in his very soul—one of a man who has been fighting for so long that even the void of sleep can’t erase it from his features. Coupled with his shock of white hair and the sallow colour of his skin, he looks like a dying man.

Something catches in his chest, because despite what he looks like, a dying man is exactly the opposite of what Shiro is now.

The team has to help him carry Shiro onto the Black Lion. He’s just as exhausted as everyone else, and on top of that is the added weight of everything he’d been through in the last few varga—that which he is staunchly refusing to address just yet. Not even his mother has asked him about it, though from her concerned expressions it’s clear she knows Keith is reaching breaking point.

He’ll tend to Shiro first, and then fall apart later.

Shiro is carefully bundled into the little respite bed behind the cockpit, and he doesn’t stir even as Keith pauses to card his fingers through his stark white hair.

He vaguely registers the others murmuring amongst themselves, and then silence falls inside the Lion as they take their leave to return to their own Lions, leaving Krolia and the space wolf behind. Keith stays where he is by Shiro’s side, trying to keep himself calm but unable to fight the feeling of something in his chest swelling rapidly, throat threatening to close up with the pressure building there. Shiro is still asleep, looking troubled even now, and try as he might Keith can’t seem to erase the memory of crazed, purple tinged eyes glaring back at him.

A hand comes to rest gently on his shoulder, snapping Keith out of his rumination. When Keith glances wearily up, he sees the soft worry of his mother as she stands by him, clearly aggrieved that she has to break his vigil.

“We need you to fly us out of here,” she says softly. “I’ll stay with Shiro until you can come back to him.”

Keith doesn’t say anything. He stands without argument and moves to take his seat in Black’s chair, but is forced to pause when Krolia’s grip tightens on his shoulder. He glances back at her, and the swollen, choking thing in his chest grows just a little more when he sees the sorrow in her gaze.

Her touch on his wounded cheek is warm, gently cradling his jaw while her thumb traces the ridges of the burn mark. He hasn’t told her yet what happened and she doesn’t ask, but it’s clear in her eyes that she wants to know. If only to be able to offer him some form of comfort.

Instead, she just steps back and nods, moving to take Keith’s spot by Shiro’s side.

At that moment, there really is no one else Keith would trust to stay by him.

Black’s presence in his mind is warm and soothing as he takes his seat. Her maternal concern is just as present as Krolia’s, and Keith has to close his eyes for a moment and take a few deep breaths because it’s only feeding that swollen painful thing in his chest. They both mean well, but it doesn’t help him focus when he’s trying to delay the inevitable as it begins to claw its way up his throat.

The other paladins are quiet, for which he’s thankful. They have their plan—a series of jumps to safe planets to gather supplies until Krolia can hail the Blade of Marmora for assistance, and from there, hyperspace jumps back to Earth.

Even with them pushing the Lion’s to their limit, it will probably take them half a decaphoeb until they reach Earth.

Once they’re barrelling through the dark reaches of space and Black assures him that she’s perfectly fine flying on her own, Keith vacates the pilot seat once more. Black doesn’t really need him to cling to her controls when they’re flying in a straight line, and for once she doesn’t completely object to anyone else sitting in the pilot seat. She allows Krolia to sit there while Keith returns to Shiro’s bedside, her presence a low purr in the back of his mind.

Shiro sleeps on.

Quietly, Keith wonders what the last thing he remembers is. If he’d had any connection at all to the thing Haggar had planted in their midst. He’d said he’d tried to reach the Paladins, so that spoke of some consciousness while stuck in the astral plane, but was that the only time? Had he been aware and watching while Keith piloted? While they fought? When the clone had become Black’s paladin?

Does Shiro remember anything the clone had done at all?

Does he remember the fight…?

Keith swallows.

That’s all it takes for the damn to break, and the swollen ugly pressure in his chest explodes outwards to leave a gaping, empty hole in its wake.

The force of the emotions from his ordeal hit him like a battering ram; a blunt force trauma to his chest that doubles him over on Shiro’s bed, dropping his head onto the sheets while he draws in a harsh, shuddering breath and tries not to make a noise. The burn on his cheek smarts in harsh reminder of how close he’d come to losing Shiro again, and then bile surges in his throat when he remembers that he’d never really found Shiro in the first place.

The sobs wrack his body in deep, painful gasps. There’s too much going on in his head for him to be able to compartmentalise it all, and he’s left floundering and drowning under waves of emotion that breach every wall and barrier he’d ever built to block them out. Recollections of everything that’s happened flash across the back of his eyelids, from the crazed look in Shiro’s eyes to the pain of the energy sword at his face; accepting death as the space station fell apart above them because if he died with Shiro then that was okay. From the moment he’d come face to face with Shiro’s spirit in the Black Lion to the warm encouragement Shiro had offered him to get him back to his team. The fight with Lotor. Allura’s desperate pleas to save him, and the decision to leave him behind. Losing the Castle. Shiro’s spirit returning to his body and the way he had smiled at Keith with such trust and relief that Keith had questioned how he’d never realised that his Shiro had been missing.

The fear. The pain. The resignation. The hope.

Keith couldn’t breathe.

“Keith…?”

The voice is soft. Hoarse. If he hadn’t been furiously trying to hold his breath in an effort not to make a noise, he would have missed it altogether.

But he wouldn’t have missed the warm hand coming to rest in his hair.

Shiro’s awake, though just barely by the looks of it. And he’s gazing at Keith with a furrow to his brow, mouth quirked downwards when he sees how red and blotchy Keith’s face must look.

“Shiro,” Keith rasps, voice thick. “You should be resting.”

“You’re crying.”

Keith shakes his head, though the evidence is hard to deny when his face is damp with tears. “Just glad you’re here. I’m fine.”

Shiro doesn’t say anything, but his hand shifts from Keith’s hair to his face, tracing the burn there with a look Keith can’t discern. His brow is furrowed, and then his eyes darken.

“I hurt you.”

No. No, no, _no_ , that is the _exact_ opposite of anything Shiro should be thinking right now.

“You didn’t,” Keith says, a little harsher than intended. “It was the clone.”

“But you thought it was me at the time.”

Keith has nothing on that. He’d known he wasn’t fighting the real Shiro, _his_ Shiro. But he was still fighting Shiro, and the distinction is so fuzzy and confusing that he has to shake his head in an effort to gather his thoughts, not quite ready to focus on the fight in such painstaking detail just yet.

“It doesn’t matter. You’re here now. You should be resting.”

He takes Shiro’s hand and pulls it away from his face with the intent to lay it back by his side, but gives pause when Shiro immediately curls his fingers around Keith’s. He doesn’t let go, and Keith sighs and closes his eyes, pressing Shiro’s knuckles against his mouth. The touch is comforting, and it’s not until he registers Shiro tugging that he opens his eyes again.

“Stay with me,” Shiro says softly.

“I’m right here.”

Shiro shakes his head and tugs again, this time more insistent.

Keith’s heart belts in his chest when he realises what Shiro is asking, and he wastes no time in crawling onto the bed beside him and settling against his side. Shiro’s arm curls around his shoulders and pulls him close, and for the first time in a long time Keith can’t think of any place he’d rather be than right here.

“I missed you,” Shiro says softly.

He’s asleep before he can realise that quiet tears are staining Keith’s cheeks again.

 

Shiro sleeps more often than he wakes.

The time within the Black Lion has drained him more than Keith realised initially, aside from the visible side effects it left him with. He wakes briefly each day, usually to Keith by his bedside, and on only one occasion has he woken longer; when they landed on their first planet to resupply, and Keith helped him off the Lion to bathe and see the other paladins.

That ordeal had left him asleep for a full eighteen hours afterwards.

He wakes to eat and to use the bathroom, but not for long and for little else at all. Keith had been worried that he wasn’t getting any better, especially after their stop on the supply planet, but Krolia had explained to him about something called _soul sickness_ , and how it could leave the physical body just as drained as any injury. It will take time, she’d said, and since it’ll be a good phoeb or two before they rendezvous with the Blade, time is almost all they have.

Keith hardly leaves his bedside.

Having lost Shiro, found him, lost him again, thought he’d found him only to learn that he’d never found him at all, learned that Shiro had actually _died_ , and then finally found him again, he’s loathe to leave distance between them. He sleeps beside Shiro on the bed, neither of them caring that it’s cramped, and sits beside him when he’s awake.

And when Shiro is awake, they talk.

Keith slowly tells him everything.

He learns that Shiro only remembers very small moments from when the Black Lion had saved him, usually those confined to when Keith was piloting. So Keith starts from there, and painstakingly knits together the story of the Paladins from that moment on. He tells him about his struggle learning to pilot Black, of how they’d successfully begun building the coalition, to Lotor’s first appearance. He tells of his training with the Blades and the missions he’d gone on, and the way he’d tried to even his duty but just never seemed to manage. About how he’d almost let Voltron fall on one terrible occasion because he wasn’t there, and so had decided to give Shiro—the other Shiro—the reigns of Voltron once more.

The only time Shiro actively grows angry is when he realises that none of the other Paladins had really tried to encourage Keith to stay, and that the other Shiro had made him feel like he had no choice but to leave.

“You’re a part of the team,” Shiro fumes. “How could they just let you leave like that?”

He only relaxes when Keith reassures him that he would never have found his mother if he’d stayed.

It gets hard when he gets to the fight.

Shiro’s expression darkens, and he’s holding Keith’s hand while Keith stops and starts and stutters his way through it. After that first night on the Lion after they’d found Shiro, he hasn’t let himself think about it much. But this is forcing him to relive it, and it’s not until he retells the events out loud does he realise just how badly he’s been affected by the thing wearing Shiro’s face and its attempts to kill him. Of just how nearly successful it had been.

He’s been quiet for a few minutes when Shiro lets go of his hand, and he draws a shuddery breath at the feeling of a thumb beneath his eye, swiping away the damp. The burn mark on his cheek is little more than an angry scar now; a permanent reminder that he’ll wear forever, but he can still feel it searing his skin as if it’s brand new.

“You fought for me,” Shiro whispers. His voice is thick. “Even when you knew I was trying to kill you. You still fought for me.”

“Of course I did,” Keith says, hating how his voice trembles. “I told you then and I’ll tell you now. I love you, Shiro.”

Shiro’s hand curls around the back of Keith’s neck, his fingers twisting in the wayward strands there while he closes his eyes and bows his head. His jaw is clenched, and when he finally looks up it’s with a hard exhale and an expression of resolve.

He tugs, and Keith moves forward without resistance, leaning in so Shiro can rest their foreheads together. They’re breathing the same air and Keith never wants to move, his heart in his throat while he tries not to fall apart again.

Shiro takes a few more deep breaths, and then breaks the silence with a whisper.

“You are everything, Keith.”

Keith’s eyes close, and he ignores the way his cheeks are wet again because Shiro kisses him. He kisses him slowly and with such emotion behind it that it’s a balm on everything that brought them to this point, and Keith decides he’d do it all again ten times over if it means this is the end result.

He presses himself helplessly forward, bringing his hands up to grip at the back of Shiro’s head like an anchor, sighing into the kiss while some small weight that’s been sitting on his chest since that fight finally disappears. Shiro clings to him just as tightly, and a dim part of Keith’s mind vaguely registers that Shiro hasn’t really had any human contact at all since his last fight with Zarkon, when everything went so badly wrong.

They linger there, neither of them willing to break apart too quickly, sharing breaths and gentle kisses without hurry.

There’s still more to say, still so much more that needs to be shared, but right now Keith is content where they are. He manoeuvres around until he’s sitting on the bed leaning against the back wall, Shiro resting against him with his head tucked against Keith’s neck. Keith has hold of his hand in one of his own, while the other gently scratches the short white hair at the back of Shiro’s neck in a soothing rhythm. It’s comfortable, and it’s welcome. They both need it.

Lotor’s fate can wait for another time. Keith is emotionally exhausted, and Shiro is still recovering, even after so many quintants spent sleeping. Shiro has a vague understanding of what happened at the remains of Daizabaal, but Keith doesn’t really care to go into detail right now—not when Shiro’s eyes are drooping and he’s struggling to stay awake.

“Keith,” Krolia calls softly from the cockpit. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah,” Keith replies. Shiro heaves a sleepy sigh, breath fanning across his collarbones. “Everything is fine.”

At least, it will be.

Given time, and plenty of rest, things will be fine. And given that they’re still quintants away from their next supply stop, Keith thinks idly to himself that time is all they have.

**Author's Note:**

> Season 6 came into my house and personally attacked me, and then tucked me into bed and kissed my battered face goodnight. 
> 
> Come say hi on [Tumblr](http://sheikofthesheikah.tumblr.com)


End file.
